'Everything Happens for a Reason' & Other Unhelpful Things People Say

Ask Us Anything! Foster and Cesar answer listener questions about working together as romantic partners on a podcast, the worst advice people give during hard times, and the intentional choice of the word "partner" instead of "girlfriend”. They share the pros and cons of creative collaboration in relationships, why the podcast has become their creative "baby," and reveal the well-meaning advice that actually hurts.

In this episode they explore: 

• The grief advice Foster finds unhelpful (even though she believes it herself)
• How working together revealed their unexpected strengths as a couple
• What their podcast has in common with having a baby together
• How they avoid ego battles while collaborating on creative projects
• Why relationships are mirrors, not hierarchies (and what that means for advice)

If this episode spoke to you, you will love Say More! Vol. 2: Hustle Culture Sucks & Other Dangerously Fun Confessions. You can also watch the episodes on YouTube.

If you enjoyed this episode, take a moment to follow Beauty in the Break on your favorite podcast app and leave a review—it really helps!

Reach out to the show—send an email or voice note to beautyinthebreakpod@gmail.com and be sure to follow on Instagram and TikTok. 

Cesar Cardona:

• Receive his newsletter Insights That Matter
• Get guided meditation from Cesar on his website 
• Listen to music from Cesar + The Clew on Apple Music and Spotify

Foster Wilson:

• Buy her poetry book Afternoon Abundance
• Learn about her postpartum services
• Receive her newsletter Foster’s Village

Created & Hosted by: Cesar Cardona and Foster Wilson

Executive Producer: Glenn Milley

This episode is brought to you by Jamaal Pittman. You can donate to his scholarship at WheelerScholarship.com, supporting college enrollment.

Transcript

Welcome back everybody to another episode

of Beauty and the Break.

Welcome.

Is it like birthday?

Birthday.

Our kid had a birthday last year.

They just had a birthday, but they had,

last year they had a birthday

and we borrowed used decor from another friend

whose birthday was the week before

because I'm thrifty like that.

And the balloons in the shape of the word happy birthday

had kind of deflated like the P and the Y and happy.

So the happy was sort of disintegrated

and all we had was a sign that said birthday.

So we just said that to each other all day.

We're like birthday.

Birthday.

Instead of happy birthday.

When we say all the kids were like jumping on board

that idea and when we went to sing happy birthday to them

we just said birthday to you.

The kids even said birthday to you.

And then.

And then this year they wanted it again.

They said let's just get a sign that says birthday.

Birthday.

And their invitation just said birthday.

Birthday.

Birthday.

It's kind of aggressive actually.

It's the tone though for sure right?

Birthday.

Birthday.

Birthday.

Birthday.

It's just a fact you were born.

Just literally it's preposterous.

We're just naming a time and that's that.

I heard that just the one thing.

(laughing)

So welcome.

Welcome.

We say nothing else.

Welcome to earth.

Spanks at the doctor.

(laughing)

I saw this thing once that said your name is just

you telling somebody the sound you want them to make

out of your mouth when they want your attention.

(laughing)

And I'm like oh yeah that makes sense.

That makes total sense because we made it all up.

That's wild.

Let me ask you a question.

Yes.

Are we doing ask you a question today?

Ask us an anything.

Aima.

A-U-A.

Ask us anything.

Oh right it's ask us anything that's right.

This is an ask us anything we weren't clear.

This is an ask us anything episode where we have

people who have written into the show

who wanted to ask us questions.

And this is a great opportunity for you.

If you have something you wanna ask us,

what is your face?

Just had an idea.

If you have something that you would like to ask us

please write in you can DM us on Instagram,

TikTok or email us at beautyinthebreakpod@gmail.com.

That's where you can find every single connection

to us.

Beauty and the Break.

That's all I have to say.

Oh okay.

Say hi.

Hi.

I'm gonna record this.

Say hello here.

I don't have a shirt on, that's the truth.

Filming an episode.

So we're doing an ask me anything today is that right?

An ask me anything.

Not an ask me anything but an ass me anything.

You can ass me anytime actually.

Okay.

Ready?

Yes.

All right so these are from our listeners.

That's right.

And we also wanna encourage you all to do the same thing.

If you have anything that you wanted to know from us

please send them in.

You just said that didn't you?

Yeah I did.

You totally did.

It bears repeating.

All right cool.

Are you ready for the first question?

I'm ready bring it.

First question is I would be curious to know

how working with each other on the podcast

has changed your relationship?

The pros and the cons.

Pros, one I learned really well to understand

each of our circle of competence.

What we both do really well happens to fit each other

wonderfully.

Yeah.

Like you know the ways of the ocean.

I know the tides.

You're so good at specifics and what the things

and like this is required for this and required for that.

And you're so in that.

That I'm like -- got it.

I know which way we should be going overall.

I know the breath and the form

and what this will look like overall

and the arcing of a story.

All of that stuff.

It's great because I hate specifics.

Yeah, yeah.

So I'm more specific oriented

and you're more big picture oriented.

I don't know that we would have figured that out

as quickly if we weren't doing this show.

I don't think we knew that about each other

when we started.

It expedited us for the reason of us doing this daily.

Talking about the show daily.

Having text messages and group messages

with our producer as well.

Daily, hourly, I get to see how detail oriented you are.

Now there's things in my life that's detail oriented

and there's things in your life that's big picture

that you focus on.

But you and I recognize those strengths that we both have.

Another pro is I'm very thrilled to have broken

all the barriers of teaming up with somebody that I'm with.

Previously we would do things with another partner

and it wouldn't go well.

Or I'd feel like I'm being stifled or not listened to

or I would stifle and not listen to the person.

I feel like we've both been able to be very much self-regulated

and regulating each other without feeling our egos

blunted or bent or whatever.

I like that a lot.

And then thirdly, I love telling the whole world

that me and my partner are hosting a podcast together.

I love it.

I went to a friend's house.

I didn't tell you this actually.

I felt like if I had brought this up

in any other time it would have been like braggadocious.

But now I'm saying it organically.

And this is much more fitting.

For the kids birthday party, I had

to go find some canopy top.

And I went to a friend's house.

And in the friend's house, they had one of their friends there.

And this lady was sitting there.

And she goes, hi, how are you?

Nice to meet you or whatever and I sit down

She goes, what are you here for looking for?

I go, oh, I'm looking for--

I'm getting up this pop-up canopy.

My partner and I are throwing a party for our kid.

That woman turned to me and goes, partner?

I go, yeah.

And I can see in her eyes already.

She's trying to find some reason to dislike that.

That I'm not saying a more specific word.

And she did that human thing that where

we like she didn't say anything, hoping I would say more.

But I'm not going to say more.

I need you to ask your question.

I'm not going to sit with this and let you try to have me answer.

Ask what you want.

Be direct.

And so my friend said, "his girlfriend".

And she goes, oh, girlfriend.

And she turns to me and goes, why don't you just say girlfriend?

And I said, well, one, I can say whatever word I'd like to.

And they all started cracking up.

And she goes, oh, he let me know.

And I was like, yes, I'm going to let you know.

Yes, for sure.

Don't come at me with that nonsense.

Say what you want.

Secondly, I said, I say partner because it

transcends my relationship with her.

We are running a business together.

She is my best friend.

She is my life partner.

She's my co-pilot.

Every single thing in my life is with her.

It transcends girlfriend.

I said, we're not interested in getting married,

so it's definitely not wife.

Partner fits best.

And she goes, OK, I appreciate that.

I go, you got it, girl.

Now be nice.

Yes.

I mean, yes, we--

it's a big endeavor to run a business, a show like this,

together.

And that is an added pro because

I get to work with my best friend every day and collaborate.

We collaborated on a couple of things with your music before.

And so we did kind of have a test the waters of knowing

how we would work together.

Only a test of water.

But barely.

Yeah, just a little bit.

This is something else.

A photo shoot here and there, a project here and there.

We were a year into our relationship

when we started this podcast.

We were three months in when we got the idea for it.

So it was untested, wholly.

I will say a pro that really stands out in my head

is that we have a group chat, like you said,

with their producer.

And we were talking, fleshing out an idea about something.

And you two had spoken about what this idea was.

And I was working and I couldn't respond yet.

And you said, that's how I feel.

But I want to wait and see what Foster has to say

because I want to hear her ideas about this.

And I remember feeling so respected by you for my ideas

and my creativity and my thoughts

that I hadn't felt previously in romantic partnership, where

I have shared creative projects before, but I just didn't.

I always felt like I was either fighting for my place

or being pushed down in some way inadvertently

and that I needed to listen to the people around me who

probably knew better.

And that feeds my insecurities as well.

That tells me I'm not good enough.

So to hear you say, no, I really value, essentially,

I really value her opinion.

I value her ideas.

And I really want to hear what her thoughts are on this.

That was so groundbreaking for me to hear and to understand

that I was in partnership with you about that.

Thanks for saying that.

It makes me feel good to know that you recognize that.

I remember that moment.

I remember texting that.

And now that I know that, I will make a point

to even say it more.

Well, it's interesting because there's

still a part of me that started out my career as an actress

and also as somebody who outputs a lot, who

is a good producer of things, whether it's movies or photo

shoots or anything, that I put my value in what I can do

and what I can accomplish.

Sometimes, especially when it came to acting,

like what my body looked like, what my appearance was.

To be appreciated for thoughts and ideas and my mind

is something that is new to me and also feels really good.

To just know that the way that I think about things,

that's natural to me, is of value to other people.

And that's kind of where I'm going in my whole life, I think,

in terms of putting less value on the output of XYZ

and more value on the just who am I.

That shifting of perspective is more fruitful in the long run.

Instead of seeking the external thing for always

the recharge and the rejuvenation and the validation,

when you do it from internally, you're consistently

going to be able to have more output.

I'm glad to hear that that feels that way for you.

I think you're fucking dope.

You got a great brain.

You're brilliant.

You have a million things running at once.

I'm mesmerized how many things you can do in any given moment.

How many things you can hold in your thought process.

It's mesmerizing.

And it's pretty great.

So I always want to hear that stuff.

You're always going to tell me something

that I'm going to at least one thing, usually more,

I'm going to say, actually, that's a great point.

And then I just try to incorporate it in what we're saying.

Because I still feel like what I'm saying is valid too.

So let's try to bring this together and walk down this middle road.

I love it when you say that.

That's a great point.

That's a great point.

I love that.

That's a great point.

All right, now the hard part for us is the cons.

Is that the only pro for you?

Well, no, it also was the kind of the things you said before too.

OK, cool.

Got it.

OK.

Cons.

Yeah, I think the cons are that we shoot the show from our house

in our own space and the bleeding over of life, fun, work, business,

kind of like it's all in one space.

There isn't a separation.

There have been peaks and valleys where I have gotten too enmeshed in the work

and not as much focused on the us of it all, of the relationship, the life part,

which is an ongoing issue for me.

But now having a project that we work together on that gives us so many reasons

to communicate about that isn't about our life and how we're experiencing things.

And what we're thinking about, it's more just like grind.

That is a complicated factor.

Right. I would agree.

It adds an urgency and a heaviness to a relationship, I think.

Yes. And then it takes so much time of the day that we have together

that when we're done with that, we're a little wiped in communicating

and sharing ideas about things that are pleasant sometimes,

where maybe we just want to just sit and chill.

There's sometimes where I'm like, you'll get home, you'll come to visit me.

And you'll be like, can we just actually just sit and talk?

Because I'm already ready to turn the TV on and do minimal.

Because we've been just like just talking all day.

It's a very valid con and the point you're making there

because in my mind, I can see myself constantly trying to keep the bleed over

from one side to the other and like squeezing the bleed from one side

to the other a little more, try to keep it separate as much as possible.

That's a good one.

Cons. One, for me, regulating my own thought process

because I want to move so much faster

than me?

Yeah. You want to move faster than me?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

But in the in a different sense, though, in the sense of the again,

the intellectual bigger picture, like we're going to get there already.

Let's just start doing it now.

We're going to inevitably want to do this version.

Let's just start jumping on it now.

And sometimes I get pushed back and I'm like really upset about it

or not really upset about I'm frustrated enough.

That's a con for me.

Our differences also the other side of that.

There is a level where I'm always like, let's chill.

Let's just do this.

If it happens, it happens. If it doesn't. It doesn't.

Sometimes having to remind myself that maybe there should be some more

organization, rigidity is necessary.

And sometimes I should say, no, we should be relaxing a little more on this.

That's hard.

It's really hard for me.

Also, con that we have things we want to talk about.

And sometimes we have to say, let's save it for the show

because we've tried flushing things out ahead of time

and then bringing it to the show.

And it's not as authentic.

It's a little flat.

Yeah, because we've both heard the stories and we've gone back and forth

from the initial jump we were guided by our producer, Glenn,

to not talk about things ahead of time.

And then I think we went the other way and we started flushing things out.

And now we're back to keeping it fresh.

Yeah.

It's interesting you say that's a con for me.

I want to do more of that.

For the sake of the show, yes.

But what about for the sake of our relationship?

That we have to, I have to hold back on telling you things

because they're going to save it for a taping, which might be in two weeks.

Right, right, right.

That part is a con because the question is about how it's changed our relationship.

So that would say it does affect our relationship in that way.

OK, yeah.

OK, I see what you're saying.

That is true.

I think another con for me has been my time of work is structured.

I do not want to work past a certain time.

I won't work at past a certain time unless it's really necessary.

One of the hard parts for me is saying to you, I'm not interested in talking

about this right now.

I'd rather review this at a different time right now is not the time.

Knowing that you are probably peak right now, you're probably in it.

And so I'm shutting you down for one, sucks.

Two, I'm leaving you on your own also sucks.

But I have to preserve my energy.

I have to preserve my quality of life for my own self.

I'm just remembering right now as I'm talking in real time that I watched my

biological father have seizures multiple times.

I sat on his lap while he had a seizure from stress and lack of sleep.

Stressful times in his life at the time and lack of sleep.

He would have seizures.

He had four of them or so in like two years or something like that.

Four years.

I was four years old sitting in his lap and he grabbed me and

they just started seizing and I just watched him go blue.

And then later on, I saw my grandfather, his father,

who's a very serious man have strokes and somewhere in there has probably told me,

you got to let go.

Don't do it.

Don't get up tight.

Don't trip.

Don't none of that.

Find what you can to stress less.

That might be a deeper rooted thing for me.

And that's why maybe that's why I picked some of Buddhism as well.

You got to let go.

You got to relax, get a chill.

Maybe that's why I moved to Southern California.

But my day with you, I'm almost always conscious that there's going to be a point

that you're going to come to me with something that I no longer want to talk

about in that moment.

And I'm torn between preserving myself and disheartening you.

That's a con.

Yeah, because my mind only hap- everything is in the very moment.

Right in this moment.

I don't know what that is, but.

You've been so dope as to never ever making me feel bad for that.

I can see sometimes you're like, damn it.

And like, what?

Why?

And like, how fucking dare him?

And but still verbally, you'll say to me, OK, OK.

I'm just going to have to add it to my to-do list and remind Caesar tomorrow about this

question I want to talk about.

So now it's going to go on the list.

Yep.

Otherwise I will not remember it.

But I will say the final pro that I have is we know that you and I will not be having

biological children together and to have something to create with you, to have--

it's a child.

It's a project, but it's an output of a creative thing, which children, life-giving,

life-force energy is also--

it's a creative entity that's out in the world, that is evergreen, that our children

will listen to, that's a time capsule of wherever we were in our life at this point,

that it exists, that it exists to help people, that it exists to share with people.

It's a really beautiful thing that I'm not sure that I had conscious awareness of when

we went into it.

Yeah.

That's a good point.

In the beginning, it was just we have a lot that we always talk about and share.

We know a lot of things about the world.

How can we just share it to other people so they can find some stuff that maybe they won't

gather in their day?

Little by little, we had to think about a name.

We had to think about a date.

We had to address it.

We had to tend to.

We had to find--

Build our support team.

Build a support team for it.

We had to do this, all the things that are required to have a baby.

I mean, Glenn is really our babysitter.

Glenn is our babysitter.

And if I may say, the doula.

The doula, yeah.

The doula as well.

Glenn Milley, producer and doula.

He is our doula.

He's exactly that.

It would not exist without him.

So there you go.

He's our doula.

Great.

Fantastic.

Do you have a question?

Oh, right.

There are other questions.

Holy moly.

So these are here going one question for an entire episode.

That's right.

Okay.

I got one here.

This is from a listener, a follower.

What advice do people give during hard times that secretly drive you crazy?

Whenever somebody says to someone else or me, it could be worse.

Or look at these people.

They have it bad.

You're upset because you're hungry.

These people don't have shoes.

Okay.

Okay.

Understandable.

That's also bad.

It doesn't have to be one way or the other.

Your validity of what is bad is on the barometer of your life experiences.

Not someone else's.

I don't think that comparing is helpful.

I don't think it's helpful at all, actually.

Yeah.

For me, there's a phrase that people say when you've gone through something really difficult,

especially loss or grief.

Oftentimes people will say everything happens for a reason.

Now the tricky thing is here on a personal level, I do believe for me that things are

happening for my greater good that I don't know yet and for therefore some kind of reason.

But that is a not helpful piece of advice to give anyone else.

You can be saying that in two different ways.

It is a discounting of their current experience, which is grief and loss.

If you would not say that to a mother who lost her child, that it happened for a reason,

that their child died for a reason, then you cannot say that to anyone in their current

experience.

It is a disvaluing of what they're currently going through.

I know plenty of people who do not believe that things happened for a reason.

Things just happen.

It's really unhelpful to say that to someone.

It's like trying to put a bandaid over a bullet wound.

I like that you're able to divide those two parts in you, saying that I will say this

about me.

I won't say this about someone else.

I would never say that to someone else.

For me personally, when I lost Wilde, that was a helpful phrase for me to say to myself.

But I would never say that to someone else.

I think you never know where someone stands.

You have no idea.

I was talking about this in a sense earlier today with a client of mine about assisted

unaliving yourself.

Can I say that here?

About assisted suicide.

And I can hold both of those.

I think people in the world should have the ability for their own autonomy to do something

like that.

And I will do whatever I can to help you not do that.

Both can happen.

I do think everything happens for a reason.

And in reverse, I think there's a reason everything happens.

It's a very subtle difference between those two.

There's an explanation for what has made this cause an effect.

And then sometimes the effect is still the cause for the next thing.

They're two different things.

I believe both of those.

I'm with a human, a person in life talking about something's going on.

My job is to just meet them right where they are.

I can't tell you that this happens.

You got to find that out for yourself.

All I can do is say like, I'm going to help you get through this transitional moment as

best as you can.

That's a good one.

This is something that comes up in friendships, especially when people are dating, people

are in relationships, right?

You want to have your friends back on things, right?

But when problems occur in a relationship, friends will often say, well, like, oh, fuck

them.

Like, nah, nah, nah, you're too good for him.

Not taking the problem and looking at it as a whole.

They're looking at like red flags, red flags, ditch this guy or ditch this girl, you know?

Every relationship that we have is a mirror for ourselves to grow.

So I think the tough love and friendship that I appreciate about my friends that are going

to look at something with me from my patterning and help me unpack whatever it is from my

perspective.

Yeah, I want that kind of friend.

Yeah.

And the friend who's just like, screw that person, get rid of them, you'll find something

better.

It makes the world, makes it look like the world is a hierarchy as opposed to relationships

are here to help other people grow.

Of course, there are situations that are like dire and full of abuse and people need to

get out and obviously all of that.

I'm just saying to jump right to break up with someone or end this because you just can't

see the multifaceted nature of a human being.

What their wounding might be or what their background might be like just like cut and

dry.

Everything's cut and dry.

Right.

Right.

Also, the friend should be able to help you find your own accountability for the things

that you may have done that aren't so great.

Yeah.

Because everybody has that.

Absolutely.

We all have that.

We all have it.

So like, I want to hear that.

Please tell me those things.

Oh, gosh, please.

I really only want to hear that because the other person's stuff is not really mine.

To take on.

It's not mine to take on.

That's a good point too.

It could just stir up or spawn something that's not even there.

Every single one of us is really just dealing with our own stuff.

Yes, to boundaries.

Yes, to clear boundaries in relationships, but we are just dealing with our own mirrors

for each other.

That is what it's all about.

So I don't know what the phrase is exactly.

Yeah, I would agree.

This sort of like all or nothing is not real.

Yeah.

There's a point where you could get there.

We're like, okay, we've exhausted everything.

You know what?

Cut this person out.

But 99 steps out of the 100 steps, there's a lot of, well, let's see if this works.

Let's try this Avenue.

Let's see if what am I missing here?

What can I express better?

There's an accountability there as well.

It's not just everyone's out to get me.

Everybody's wrong.

We're not politicians.

Well, thank you for listening to our Ask Us Anything.

And if you have a question for us about anything, let us know and maybe we'll feature you in

a future episode.

We love it.

We love it.

We love it.

Excites us.

We love connecting with you all.

Send us a voice note.

I promise we will respond back.

Dude, send that voice note.

I'll send you a voice note right back.

You'll get my sultry voice saying your name directly.

Wow.

What an honor.

I know, right?

Oh my God.

Have a good one.

Be kind to yourself.

If this episode spoke to you, take a moment and send it to someone else who might need

it.

That's the best way to spread these conversations to the people who need them the most.

And if you want to keep exploring with us, make sure to follow Beauty and the Break wherever

you get your podcasts.

We'll see you next time.

Beauty and the Break is created and hosted by Foster Wilson and Cesar Cardona.

Our executive producer is Glenn Milley.

Original music by Cesar + the Clew.